


Discipline

by ZombieBabs



Series: Behavioral Modification [2]
Category: The Black Tapes Podcast
Genre: (And I Mean -- SUPER Light), Adults In Time Out, Alex Is A Gentle Dom, Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Food Issues, Guilt, Hair-pulling, Hand Feeding, Kink Evolution, Kink Negotiation, Light BDSM, Office Makeouts, Praise Kink, Slow Burn, Smut, Strand Is A Sub, The Subbiest Sub Who Ever Subbed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-30
Updated: 2016-10-18
Packaged: 2018-08-18 14:58:28
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 12,379
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8165956
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ZombieBabs/pseuds/ZombieBabs
Summary: Things change, after what Alex dubs The Breakdown. Not completely. Not in obvious ways. But Alex notices something definitely shift between her and Strand.





	1. Prolouge

Things change, after what Alex dubs The Breakdown. Not completely. Not in obvious ways. But Alex notices something definitely _shift_ between her and Strand.

“What do you mean?” Nic asks, when she asks him about it one day over take out.

“I don’t know,” Alex says, twisting noodles around her plastic fork. “Just, have you noticed anything different about him lately?”

“I guess you could say that he hasn’t been himself for a while now. Why do you ask?”

Alex takes a bite of her food, allows herself a moment to think as she chews. “Well, I told you that he kind of just--that he broke down, right?”

Nic nods. “Yeah. That was...kind of awful.”

“Yeah,” Alex says. “It kind of was.”

“So, what about it?” 

“Well, I know it must have had something to do with Howard’s journal. The one Thomas Warren gave to Strand. I know we agreed to let Strand look through it first, but now, every time I ask to see it, he gives me an excuse or tries to distract me with other Black Tapes stuff.”

Nic taps at his lips with the prongs of his fork. “That could be a problem.”

Alex spears a few bean sprouts onto her fork, but she doesn’t lift them out of the container. “I don’t think it’ll come to that.”

“Good,” Nice says. He shovels up a forkful of rice, but it only makes it halfway to his face. He tilts his head, in that inquisitive way he has that’s always secretly reminded her of his dog. “Is that it, though? It doesn’t sound like that’s it.”

“No,” Alex says. She sighs and lays her fork down, no longer hungry. “I don’t know how to explain it. It’s like, he’s been more subdued than normal. You’ve seen him. He’s been really quiet and withdrawn.”

“It has been a long time since we’ve seen that signature Strand smile, hasn’t it?”

Alex had seen it--a perverse mockery of it--during The Breakdown. But Alex had glossed over that part, not wanting to have to explain Strand’s sudden, strange need to be punished to Nic. 

Because even if she wanted to explain it, she couldn’t. Not really.

She’d made it clear to Strand that she wanted to talk about the incident. She’d wanted to lob question after question at him. But she’d taken one look at his exhausted, red-rimmed eyes, and she’d driven him home. And--because he is Richard Strand and getting personal information out of him is like pulling teeth without anesthesia--since then, he’s managed to dodge her questions about that night about as well as he’s managed to keep her away from his father’s journal.

That is to say, completely.

“You’re right,” Alex says, instead. “It has been a while.”

Nic makes a thoughtful sound around a mouthful of food. Thankfully, he swallows before saying, “Just be careful, okay?”

“You know me. ‘Careful’ is my middle name.”

Nic laughs. “Are you sure? Because, I could have sworn it was ‘Anne.’”

Alex steals his eggroll in retaliation.

“Hey!”


	2. Time Out

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I forgot to mention that this might be a little bit of a slow burn. Gotta work our way up to the Good Stuff, peoples. :P

“As I’ve said--countless times now--you were not _possessed_. There are no such things as demons, or angels, or a smiling, benevolent God. There is only corporate greed and--”

Alex grabs Strand by the arm, cutting him off.

“I’m sorry,” she says to the fuming woman across the table. “Will you excuse us for a moment? My colleague and I need to have a word.”

Alex doesn’t wait for the woman to answer. She pulls Strand bodily from his seat and leads him to an empty recording studio. 

He doesn’t protest, not even when she nearly slams to the door behind them. 

“What the _hell_ is wrong with you?”

Strand is scowling, his hands very nearly clenched by his sides. “There is nothing _wrong_ with me.”

“Really? Because it looked to me like you were pretty out of line back there.”

“That woman believes that she was possessed by a demon. That it was somehow exorcised by a machine and trapped in a box, like the--like the _Ghostbusters_.”

“And that gives you the excuse to go on an anti-religious rant? You can’t _mock_ the people we interview for what they believe in, just because you might not agree with it!”

Strand breathes out through his nose, clearly furious. “She--”

Alex cuts him off. “No. She didn’t do anything. You did. You need to go out there and apologize.”

Strand straightens to his full height, towering over her. He crosses his arms across his chest. “No.”

“Then you can stay here. I don’t want to see you until you’ve calmed down and can act your damned age.”

Alex doesn’t wait for a response. She storms out of the studio and only stops once she’s outside the conference room where she’d left her interviewee. She makes herself take three deep breaths and pastes a smile onto her face before she opens the door. “Sorry about that. Where were we?”

After Strand’s exile, the interview goes a little easier. Alex will have to do some _major_ editing to salvage any of the material before his exit, but it won’t be anything she can’t handle. She’s more disappointed that Strand hadn’t returned to the conference room like she’d hoped.

“Hey,” she says to Nic, when they pass each other in the hall. “Have you seen Strand anywhere?”

Nic frowns. “I thought he was with you.”

“We had some issues while we were interviewing Marie. I guess he must have gone home.”

He gives her a sympathetic look. “More Strand weirdness?”

“Tell me about,” she says, rolling her eyes.

Nic laughs. “Don’t beat yourself up over it. Anyway, we have some narration work for Tanis and I could use your help. You up for it?”

“Sure. Be there in a sec.”

~*~

It’s late, when Alex finally makes it back to her office. She’s packing up her bag when Nic stops in her doorway, a strange expression on his face.

“What’s up?” she asks, half on alert for bad news.

“I, uh. I think I found Strand.”

A thousand different possibilities run through her head, before she makes herself stop and take a breath, before she can jump to any conclusions. “What? Where? Is he okay?”

“Um. Studio C?”

“Still?”

“Yeah, I guess.” Nic says. He leans up against the jam, his feet crossed at the ankles, the worry line in his forehead making an appearance. “I thought you said you didn’t know where he was?”

“We had an argument and I told him he could stay there until he stopped acting like a child. When he didn’t come back to the interview, I figured he must have gone home. Why the hell would he chose to stay in there?”

“Almost like a time-out, right?” Nic laughs, but the smile slips off his face when he sees Alex’s expression fall. “Alex?”

_Time-out_. 

For fuck’s sake.

She’s an _idiot_. 

“Thanks, Nic. I’ll take care of it. Why don’t you head on out?”

“Sure,” he says, drawing out the word. He lingers in the doorway, waiting for her to explain, but when Alex doesn’t elaborate, he finally shuffles down the hall, back to his own office.

Alex gives herself a moment to mentally kick herself, before she hefts the strap of her messenger bag over her head and makes her way toward Studio C. 

How? How could she have forgotten Strand’s need to be punished?

Why else would he have stayed cooped up in a recording studio for _hours_? Just because she--what? Because she said so?

She pushes the door to Studio C open and almost doesn’t see him. But he’s there, when her eyes sweep the room a second time, sitting against the back wall. Arms are crossed, lying on top of his knees, which have been pulled to his chest. His face is turned away from her, his head pillowed on top of his arms.

“That doesn’t look comfortable,” she says as she steps into the room. She closes the door behind her and the soft click of the latch makes him flinch. “What are you still doing here? I thought you went home hours ago.”

“You said to stay here,” he says, the words muffled by his arms.

“Yeah, but I didn’t mean you had to stay _forever_. Just until you came to your senses. I thought you’d only be gone for like, five minutes, tops.”

Strand shakes his head, as forthcoming about this--whatever _this_ is--as he is about anything else.

Alex sighs. She crosses the room to sit down next to him. She puts her arm on his back and rubs in between his shoulder blades. “Seriously, why’d you stay?”

Strand’s shoulders lift in a half-hearted shrug. “I don’t know.”

“I think you do,” Alex says.

Strand doesn’t say anything. And Alex doesn’t push, even though she knows she probably should. Before any of this gets too out of hand.

“C’mere,” she says, instead of voicing the numerous questions clamouring in her head. She pulls him until he leans against her, and once again, he lets her manhandle him. Once again, she finds her fingers brushing through his hair.

He sighs, after a moment. Slowly, his muscles uncoil and he leans more of his weight against her. 

Minutes tick by as they sit in silence, Alex petting Strand’s hair.

Finally, he turns his face toward her. “I’m sorry,” he says. “For the way I acted.”

“Thanks.” Alex nudges him with her shoulder. “Though, I think you’ve more than made up for it, by now.”

Strand gives her a weak smile and a soft breath of laughter. But the smile is gone just as soon as it had arrived. “Alex, I don’t--I’m not--”

She nudges him with her shoulder again. “I know. We’ll figure it out.”

He blinks, surprised. “We?”

Alex smiles and pushes a lock of hair away from his forehead. “Yeah, well, someone has got to let you know when enough is enough. You’re a parent, don’t you know that you’re only supposed to put someone in time-out one minute per their age in years? You’re clearly doing this whole discipline thing wrong if you been here--” Alex checks the time on her phone and winces. “--going on six hours, now.”

“I had not realized that it was so long.” 

“No?”

“It was quiet.”

Alex has a feeling that he means more by that than just the soundproofing in the recording studio.

“Well, how about now?” she asks. “Feeling better? Ready to get out of here?”

He nods.

“Alright then.” Alex pushes herself up and offers Strand her hand. He groans as she helps to pull him to his feet. She can’t imagine how stiff he must be after sitting in one place for so long.

As they make their way through the PNWS building, Alex notices that Strand does look a little better than he did earlier in the day. Calmer. More focused.

“How was the interview?” Strand asks.

“Good,” she says. “After--well. What do you say we go get some dinner and I can tell you all about it?”

“I would like that.”


	3. Just Your Average Haunting

Alex insists on watching the rest of Strand’s Black Tapes. There are hundreds of them, but she has to see for herself, to put together any more connections between them, to track down new leads. 

She also insists on watching them in his living room, for both their sakes. If she has to watch potentially terrifying footage, she wants to do it during daylight hours, with the sun streaming in through the bay window. And Strand already spends an unhealthy number of hours down in his basement bunker, lost in his research. She’ll take any excuse to force him to spend time in the rest of the house, which, with Ruby’s help, has begun to feel quite homey. 

She’s sitting on his recycled sofa, a notepad lying on the center cushion. Her recorder rests perched on top of a book on the coffee table, where it can better pick up their voices as they discuss each Tape, as well as the audio from the Tapes themselves. 

Strand walks in, a steaming mug in each hand. Coffee for Alex and black tea for himself. He places both mugs on the coffee table.

“Thanks,” Alex says, smiling up at him. “Ready to start this next one?”

“Are you?” he asks, the corner of his mouth tilted up in a teasing smile.

Alex holds out the remote, her finger hovering over the ‘Play’ button. “Just sit down already.”

He does. Right on the floor at her feet.

Alex blinks, but Strand just arranges his long limbs, crossing his legs and leaning his back against the sofa.

“I, uh, didn’t mean right _there_.”

“I know,” he says, still facing the black screen of the television.

“Are you comfortable down there? You can sit up here with me, if you want.”

Strand twists around and he has to look up at her from his position on the floor. There is something meaningful in his eyes--something intense with a hint of a challenge. 

“Okay,” she says. “Alright. You can stay there. Just _tell me_ if you start to get uncomfortable, okay?”

She wants to add, ‘That’s an order,’ but she doesn’t want to push too far--she’s still finding her footing when it comes to this new thing between them.

Because it’s not _just_ punishment, as she’s learned over the past week. Strand wants someone to be _in charge_ \--needs it, sometimes, in a way Alex isn’t sure she understands. 

He’ll send her a look, his expression subtle, but unmistakably overwhelmed, and Alex knows that that’s her cue to take over. Mostly, she’s just sent him to time out--usually to Studio C, when they’re at the PNWS office, or _to his room_ , when they’re at his father’s house. Never for the same amount of time as she had inadvertently done the first time, however.

It’s worth it, all of it, to see him come back, closer to his usual self than he’s been in nearly a year. Even if Alex feels like she has _no idea_ what she’s doing.

And, despite herself, Alex can’t help the thrill that goes through her whenever he submits. She likes how pliant he can be, once she’s punished him. Perhaps more than she should.

He seems to enjoy when she plays with his hair, so that’s exactly what she does now. Placing her hand on his head, she skritches at his scalp with her fingernails.

Strand sighs and leans into the touch and Alex smiles. She presses play and the Tape begins.

“So, what category does this one fall in? Upside-down faces? Demons? Kids with creepy imaginary friends?”

“Just your average haunting,” Strand murmurs. “You can skip through this part.”

Alex tracks forward through the video. It’s old security footage, from what appears to be a grocery store. Several shoppers push carts through aisles in double time before Strand says, “Here.”

The timestamp in the corner of the screen reads close to midnight. Alex, practiced in looking for tall shadows in places where shadows should not be, doesn’t see anything immediately out of the ordinary. There is a lone store clerk unpacking cans onto one of the shelves. He turns, looking behind him, before shaking his head and continuing his work. 

“Okay,” Alex says, still absent-mindedly running her fingers through his hair. “I don’t see anything.”

“Wait,” Strand says.

She doesn’t have to wait long.

The shelves behind the store clerk explode. Or rather, everything that had been on the shelves explodes outward, all at once. Cans of vegetables, boxes of dry pasta, bags of generic cereal--all of it goes flying.

The store clerk, clearly terrified, dodges what he can. Then he runs. He runs down the aisle and out of the frame. 

Alex looks down, only then realizing that her hand has fisted in Strand’s hair, pulling it tight in her fright. She lets go, immediately. “Shit, sorry.”

“No,” Strand says, still facing the video. It continues to play, the only movement on the screen the rolling of cans down the aisle. He clears his throat. “It’s okay.”

Alex pauses the video and pulls his head back so that she can see his face. His pupils are blown wide and color stains his cheekbones.

She breathes out, relaxing, even as she feels color rise in her own face. Even as her heart beats faster in her chest. “You didn’t do anything wrong, dummy.”

Strand closes his eyes and Alex regrets that he still isn’t comfortable talking to her, with meeting her eye to eye and discussing whatever it is that goes on inside his head. She hates that he feels like he has to hide from her. “I scared you.”

Alex rolls her eyes. “ _You_ didn’t scare me. The video did. And _I’m_ the one who asked to watch it.”

A slow smile curls at his lips. He doesn’t have to say anything for Alex to know that he still blames himself. He’s still the one who collected the Tapes in the first place, after all. 

Or, she supposes, his guilt could stem from somewhere else--because it still makes no sense to her. Her gut tells her that Howard Strand’s journal is to blame for it, that something Richard Strand read in it caused some sort of breakdown, something so drastic that he would actively seek punishment for it. But she can’t begin to guess what something of that magnitude could be. And she can’t confirm her suspicions until she can get the journal from Strand. He’s still unwilling to give it to her.

Either way, there’s no use arguing about it. They’re only on the first shelf of Strand’s closet of Black Tapes cases. They have a long way to go.

“Alright, so, what makes this a Black Tape. Seems like something any amateur special effects team could do.”

“There aren’t any frames missing.” Strand points to the timestamp, but Alex had been more interested in the exploding shelf than watching the numbers. “I had the footage analyzed, but it wasn’t doctored.”

“Couldn’t they have rigged something up to explode in real time?”

Strand points again, this time to the empty shelves. “There’s nothing there. The owner of the store thought there might have been something on the other side of the shelf, but when she had the clerks pull everything down, it was just as empty. That’s when she called the Institute.”

“And couldn’t someone be lying?”

Strand twists around to look up at her, smiling his sideways smile. “It’s always probable that someone is lying.”

“Right,” Alex says. And then, because she can’t help but tease him, “Cynic.” 

“Realist,” he says.

“So, what, nothing like this ever happened again? Can you call it a haunting if spooky shit only happens once?”

Strand laughs. “Dr. Emily DuMont declared it to be a poltergeist, but her claims remain unsubstantiated because the store clerk in the video was never seen again.”

Alex shivers. She can’t help but think of all of those who have gone missing during her investigation into the Black Tapes. “He disappeared?”

Strand’s smile widens. “No. He went back to work the next day. Which Dr. DuMont would have known had she been involved in the actual investigation.”

Alex laughs. “People and places,” she says, echoing something he’d said when they’d first met.

“People and places,” he agrees.

They spend a few more minutes discussing the Black Tape and Alex makes sure to jot down notes before they start on the next one. This time, when Strand returns after popping a thumb drive into the side of the television, she doesn’t say anything when he returns to his place at her feet. She finds that she really doesn’t mind it.

She really doesn’t mind it, at all.


	4. Sugar & Earl Grey Tea & A Hint of Cinnamon

“Eat,” Alex reminds him, before taking a bite out of her sandwich. 

“I’m not hungry.”

“You keep saying that, but I know for a fact that this morning you destroyed your bagel rather than eating it. Beyond tea, I haven’t seen you actually ingest something in far too long. Eat.”

Strand sighs and starts to pick his own sandwich apart. He removes the bread and, using a fork, starts to disassemble the fixings in between.

“Strand,” she says. She waits for him to look at her and gives him a meaningful look. “Do I need to tie you down and force you to eat?”

The color drains from his face. 

Mechanically, he picks up a bit of turkey and swiss and starts to eat.

Alex blinks, not understanding. He’s _never_ reacted this way when she’s threatened to punish him. “Hey, are you okay?”

“Fine,” he says. He’s retreated inside of himself, blocking her out completely.

“You’re not,” she says. But it’s like arguing with a brick wall, for all of the expression she gets out of him.

After only a few bites, Strand pushes his plate away. 

“Do you want any of my fries?” Alex asks. She keeps her voice measured, trying not to convey any of her disappointment or confusion. She doesn’t want him to think that he has yet another thing to feel guilty for.

It doesn’t surprise her when he shakes his head.

“Okay,” she says. “That’s okay. Why don’t we get out of here? We still have a few more of your Tapes to watch before I need to be at the studio.”

Alex insists on paying, leaving Strand to sit at their table, his tall frame hunched over his water glass, his fingers toying with the straw.

“Can I interest you in a pastry today?” asks the young man at the counter. He smiles his best customer service smile and gestures toward a glass case. “All baked fresh, every day.”

She nearly says no. But one look at the cinnamon buns, icing dripping to pool on the wax paper underneath, changes her mind. “A couple of those, please.”

Treats packed carefully in a brown paper bag, Alex makes her way back to Strand. “Ready to go?”

“What’s that?” Strand asks, his eyes drawn immediately to the paper bag, his brows knitted together, as if he can’t imagine where she might have acquired it. 

“Something special,” she says, smiling. “I’ll share it with you if you’re good.”

He perks up, a little, at that. He wets his lips. “And if I’m not? Good?”

A devilish smile curls at her lips. “Then you’ll never get to find out what’s in the bag.”

~*~

Strand comes out of the shell he’s built around himself, little by little, as they go through more of his Black Tape cases. 

There doesn’t seem to be much in the way of organization--the Tapes placed randomly on the shelves with no rhyme nor reason that Alex can make out. They watch a video, sent in to the Strand Institute by a children’s home, of a toddler singing. The words are guttural and strange, in a language Strand assures Alex is so old and dead that it is generally only seen on paper. 

They watch another video, the camera placed at the back of a lecture hall. The power goes out as the professor gives a lecture on what appears to be economics, the hall lit only by the light of the emergency exit sign. A tall shadow moves over the whiteboard, even though none of the students move from their seats. Until one of the student’s looks up from her notebook and screams, causing another student to jostle the camera and send it crashing to the floor, where it cuts to black. The lecture hall, Strand tells her, is an auditorium, without any windows.

The last video that they watch, before Alex has to call it quits, can hardly be considered a video, at all. There are no visuals, just a black screen. Strand warns her that it is the audio that is disturbing, but Alex still isn’t prepared for what she hears. Screaming. Men and women, children even, all screaming in agony and anguish. The screams overlap, blending into one another, echoing, as if from a distance. Toward the end of the video, Alex hears the sound of someone crying and the shuffling of the person holding the camera, before the audio goes silent.

Alex should be terrified--and she is. But it’s easier, somehow, with Strand there, sitting quietly at her feet. She keeps seeing him sneak glances toward the paper bag on the coffee table out of the corner of her eye. It makes her smile, despite her fear.

He could just reach over and open the bag, could satisfy his curiosity at any time. But Alex knows that he won’t. 

The knowledge makes something flutter in her chest. It makes her feel powerful, in control of her life, for once. 

It makes her want to plant her hands on either side of his face and kiss Strand senseless.

Alex doesn’t realize that she’s staring until she notices that Strand has turned around, that he’s watching her in return.

“You’ve been so good,” she says.

His eyes turn dark, his pupils dilating. “I have?”

“You have. I just have one question, and if you answer me truthfully, I’ll let you open the bag.”

He stares up at her, expectant, yet wary. 

“Why did you freak out earlier? At the restaurant.”

Strand ducks his head, but Alex tips his chin back up, not letting him hide. “Don’t shut down on me now. I’m not upset. I just need to know what I said that made you feel so uncomfortable.”

“Why?”

“Because we can’t keep doing this if you won’t tell me when I’ve crossed a line.”

He jerks under her hands, frowning. It’s subtle, but there is anxiety swimming through his eyes. Alex brushes her fingers through his hair, pushing it back from his forehead, trying to reassure him.

“No restraints,” he says. The words tumble out of his mouth, as if he’s afraid that if he doesn’t get them out, they’ll disappear. 

“Okay,” she says. She cards her fingers through his hair again, a small reward for telling her the truth. “That’s okay. Can you tell me why?”

“I--” He swallows. “Handcuffs.”

She has to think for a moment, before it comes to her. 

The man before her has been arrested more than once in his life--charged with two murders he never committed and charged with an assault that he had. Handcuffs, even the idea of being restrained, would undoubtedly bring up bad memories for him. 

“Good,” she says, stroking his hair, “So good. Thank you for telling me.”

His breath comes out all in a rush. He smiles, small and half-shy, at the praise. 

“You can have your surprise now,” she says. The words have barely left her when he reaches over with one long arm and plucks the bag from the table.

She watches as he unrolls the paper and reaches into the bag, pulling out a plastic container. He stares down at it, then up at her, his brows drawn down. 

“You don’t have to eat it now, if you don’t want to. But I _know_ you like sweets--I’ve seen how much sugar you put into your coffee.”

He huffs out a breath of laughter. The plastic container cracks loudly as he pops it open. He inhales the sweet scent of cinnamon and sugar, his eyes closing in appreciation. 

“Here,” Alex says. She takes the container from him. She pulls a small piece from the pastry, her fingers immediately covered in icing. 

Blushing furiously, she offers the piece to him. “Taste it.”

Strand’s eyes go wide. He leans forward and takes the piece with his mouth, his teeth nipping at her fingertips.

Alex moves to take her hand back, but Strand grabs it and doesn’t let go until he’s licked the icing from her fingers, one at a time, his eyes never leaving hers as he pays each one particular attention.

“Fuck,” Alex says, suddenly breathless. She’s so absolutely turned on--she’s practically _throbbing_ with want. She presses her thighs together and swallows, her mind suddenly thrown back to The Breakdown, to Strand’s mouth brushing the skin of her midriff, to how much she had wanted him then, too. “I want to kiss you. Can I kiss you?”

“Please,” he says, equally breathless.

“Please yes or please no?” She’s teasing him, she knows, but she enjoys the intensity with which he looks at her, nearly pleading with her.

“ _Yes_. I want--”

Alex pulls him up by his shirt, crushing her lips to his. Their teeth clack together before she eases off, just a little, just enough to slot their lips together at a better angle. 

Strand lets her set the pace, melting into the kiss with a sigh, letting her thread her hands behind his head and direct him as she desires. She catches his bottom lip between her teeth and he inhales, quick and sharp, when she bites down. His hands clutch at her shoulders, fingers curled into the fabric of her shirt, desperate to touch, but not daring to do more than hold onto her, to ground himself as her lips move against his.

He tastes like sugar when she licks her way into his mouth. Sugar and earl grey tea and the slightest hint of cinnamon. 

“Fuck,” she says again, once she finally pulls away. 

Strand looks at her with half-lidded eyes. He looks almost drunk with lust, but he doesn’t follow her when she sits back on the sofa, doesn’t move to touch her. The image of him, sitting with his hands on his lap, patiently waiting for her to touch him, is nearly enough to undo her.

But she told Nic that she would return to the studio, to follow up on a lead he’d found for one of the newest Black Tapes cases. 

She closes her eyes, committing the scene to memory, before she says, “I have to go.”

He sits back on his heels as if she’d pushed him away from her. His expression cycles from hurt, to disappointment, to something altogether blank.

“Shit,” she says, “No, Richard. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it like that.”

She sits forward and bends down to capture his lips once more. She lingers there in something approaching chaste until he responds, softening the hard line of his mouth and meeting the press of her lips with his own. 

“I didn’t mean it like that,” she says again. “I told you earlier that I would have to meet with Nic. Remember?”

“Oh. Yes, I remember.”

“Good.” Alex smiles and reaches out to straighten his glasses. “There are two pastries. Have one for breakfast, okay? I’ll let you know what Nic and I find when I come over tomorrow.”

Strand nods, then helps her to gather her things. He walks her to the door and then watches from the porch as she gets into her car. 

Alex smiles at him, a smile she hopes is full of promise, and reverses out of the driveway.

On the drive back to the studio, she does her best not to think about Strand’s hot mouth and the places he could put it to good use.

She has to press her thighs together when heat pools between her legs when her best is not quite good enough.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yay, kissing!


	5. Spare Key

Alex doesn’t get to see Strand for a week after their kiss.

He gets called back to Chicago on urgent Institute business and takes the next flight out.

He leaves her with the spare key to his father’s house, giving her permission to continue watching his Tapes in his absence. 

Alex nearly doesn’t take him up on his offer, too nervous to watch without him. In the end, however, she finds herself slotting the key into the lock and pushing her way inside of the old Victorian.

She’s a big girl. And she’s already proved to herself, over the past few weeks, that she can handle watching even the most terrifying footage in Strand’s collection. Nevermind that Strand had been there for all of it--his skepticism just as comforting as it could be frustrating.

Besides, she tells herself, it’s not as if she’s getting any sleep to begin with. What are a few more nightmares to add to the company already knocking around inside her head?

The house smells like him. At first, it had smelled strongly of dust and mold. Soon after, the smell had been replaced with environmentally friendly paint and freshly sanded recycled wood. Now, even with Strand not currently in residence, it smells like him. 

She realizes, as she takes a deep breath, that she misses him.

She’s missed him before, of course, but always in another context. She’s missed having him on her podcast, missed having him by her side during investigations. She’s even missed him as an anxious friend, wondering about the danger she’d put him in, about the turmoil she’d inadvertently stirred up in his life, hating every moment of not knowing whether he was okay or not. 

But this? This feels entirely different.

There is an ache somewhere in her chest. Almost as if there is an empty space inside her, like a hole where Strand should be, but isn’t.

And she’s not altogether certain what to do about it.

She finds herself heading not to the closet where Strand keeps his Tapes, but wandering from room to room. There aren’t a lot of personal touches--nearly none, at all, in fact--but Alex can sometimes see his input in some of Ruby’s design choices. Dark wood stains that shine red when the sunlight hits it just right, earthy tones and clean lines, subtle yet tasteful decor to bring texture and depth to each room. 

There are only bits and pieces of Strand scattered around the house. A well-loved mug, the insides tea-stained after many, many uses. A photograph of Charlie, taken in her teens, before she’d lost her stepmother. An old book, the dust jacket missing and the title worn off of the cover. Alex knows that it’s because he plans to sell the house. That it’s his way of continuing to distance himself from his father. But it still makes her wonder what his home in Chicago might look like. 

She hates to think it might be just as Spartan there as it is in his father’s house. That she would have to hunt for signs of his inhabiting the space, much like she’s had to in this house, even after so many months of him living in it.

Alex wanders from room to room, and then, once she’s visited all of the rooms on the bottom floor, makes her way up the stairs to the second floor. The old stairs creak and moan under her weight, too-loud in the silence of the otherwise empty house.

The master bedroom, Alex knows, has been converted into an extra storage space. There are boxes that still haven’t been unpacked, furniture that hadn’t quite made the cut, art that has yet to find its place on the walls. There are sheets over everything to keep the dust out, making the room look haunted by oddly shaped ghosts. Alex closes the door without bothering to go in.

Strand’s room is further down the hall. He’d chosen a smaller room, over the master bedroom. When she’d asked him about it, he’d told her it was due to the positioning of the house, that he prefered his bedroom be on the west, so he could escape the early-morning sun. Alex had only half-believed him. She thinks that a lot of it must have come from him being uncomfortable with taking over his father’s old room.

She’s seen the interior of his room before. She’d knocked gently at the door after sending him to time-out, had waited for his permission to open the door. She’d waited in the doorway for him to emerge, often looking sheepish, but pleased. Certainly much more calm than he’d been going in. But Alex has never actually gone inside his room.

Until she slips inside, closing the door after her.

The smell of him is stronger here, than the rest of the house. 

His bed, unlike her own, has been freshly made. There are no piles of laundry, clean or otherwise, like those that plague her own apartment. There is a stack of books on the desk, along with a laptop, but no stray dishes, no piles of paperwork and unanswered mail. Everything is in its place.

And, of course, Strand _would_ be the type of person who’d refuse to have a television in his bedroom.

There’s a book on one of the bedside tables and Alex sits down on the edge of the bed to examine it.

_According to_ The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch, Alex reads from the back cover, _(the world’s only completely accurate book of prophecies, written in 1655, before she exploded), the world will end on a Saturday. Next Saturday, in fact. Just before dinner._

Turning the book back around, Alex laughs softly at the image of what she assumes is supposed to be a demon (going by the cartoon devil horns, bat wings, and pointed tail), wearing a suit and tie and _lounging_ with a glass of wine in his hands. “Good Omens, huh?”

Slipping her feet out of her shoes, Alex lays back on the bed, opening the book to its first page. 

She reads for a long while, until her eyes grow heavy. She places the book on her stomach, closing her eyes for what she tells herself will be just a moment, just until she can open her eyes and keep them open, but soon falls into sleep.

~*~ 

Alex wakes with a start.

Groggy and confused, her first thought is to check her phone for the time. She has to wrestle it out of the pocket of her jeans, but when she sees that it’s only been a couple hours, she flops back in relief.

She hadn’t meant to fall asleep in Strand’s bed. But the blankets are sun-warm and soft, the pillow inviting under her head. Even the book had helped lull her into a sleep free--for once--from demons. Funny, considering the material.

Alex stretches with a groan, her arms snaking above her head, one hand finding itself underneath the pillow she’d been lying on.

There is something under the pillow.

Something rectangular. Something with a thin leather binding. Something that feels remarkably like the journal Alex had seen Thomas Warren slide across the table to Strand, all the weeks ago.

Alex knows she should leave the journal where it is. 

But now that she knows where Strand has hidden it, now that it’s--literally--in her grasp, the words within it are too tempting to ignore.

She wants to know _everything_. 

So she takes it. She shoves it into her back pocket and makes her way downstairs, makes her way out of the house, pausing only to lock the door. 

Strand will be gone for a few more days. She’ll have plenty of time to read the journal and return it before he gets back.

The journal _burns_ in her back pocket, all the way back to the studio.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> you thought there would be more kissing, didn't you?
> 
> ...oops.
> 
> >:}


	6. Once Upon A Time

It’s a good thing that Howard Strand is dead.

Or Alex may have had to do something _really_ drastic.

As it is, there’s nothing she can do with the knowledge that she’s gained from the journal. Nothing, except pace, as she has been doing since she put the journal down, having read every last page. Nothing but pace back and forth, back and forth, in an attempt to burn off the nervous energy coursing through her veins. 

It does _nothing_ to take away her fury, however. No, that burns under her skin, so hot she feels as if she could catch fire at any moment.

It turns out, the man that had beaten his son, who had screamed at him to believe in the facts after a little boy had expressed his fears after seeing a tall, terrifying shadow, had never been entirely skeptical of it all. It turns out, that the man had been grooming his son for something big, something--

She’s getting ahead of herself. Howard Strand’s crimes against his family started far earlier.

Once upon a time, a handsome, charming man met a beautiful, intelligent woman. But this was not by chance. No, the handsome, charming man had sought the beautiful, intelligent woman out on purpose. 

The woman had a very special lineage. A lineage she was not aware of, but the man--the man had been tracking it as part of his research. Research into the occult and an ancient chthonic goddess called, among other names, Tiamat. The man never tells the woman about her special genetics. Instead, after a few short months, he convinces her to marry him.

The woman, of course, was very much in love with the handsome, charming man. A man who could regale her for hours about his travels, all over the world. Who treated her like she was a goddess, herself.

Until she bore him two children, a boy and a girl.

After that, the man distanced himself from his beautiful, intelligent wife. 

His work, of course, was much more important. And he had done his part in this little experiment--it would be years before any of it bore fruit. If it would, in fact, bear fruit.

He finds himself asked to speak more and more at universities, applauded for his knowledge of ancient artifacts and civilizations. Until, one day, he gets to meet his mysterious benefactor.

That day, he is initiated into the Cult of Tiamat.

They have been following his movements, his research, much as he had followed the lineage of the beautiful, intelligent woman. They have answers, they tell him, answers that can only be shared if he works for them--with them. Toward a greater good, they tell him. To build society anew, to build it better, cleaner, more _pure_ than before.

Richard, the man’s son, a young boy now, admits to seeing the Tall Men. Cheryl, the man’s daughter looks on, silent, but knowing, as Richard gets the strap.

It seems as if his experiment has born fruit after all. Two, ripe for the picking.

And, at the urging of the Cult, he does.

He starts to indoctrinate Richard, the quiet boy with the same intelligent blue eyes as his mother. The boy is smart, but not as smart as his sister, and therefore, it is easier to do what he must do.

According to the Cult, the man must ready the boy, to groom him to become the key that brings Tiamat back to the world. To take on her spirit, her godhood. To bring darkness to the world in order to bring light to it once more. It is Richard who shall usher in the new world.

It’s not until it’s too late that the charming, handsome man begins to feel the stirrings of guilt.

It’s not until it’s too late that he sees his family, the strain he has put on them, that he decides against sending Richard away. The health of his beautiful, intelligent wife has begun to decline because of it, because of _him_. 

The Cult is not pleased with his newfound conscience. Howard, the handsome, charming man, goes on the run, abandoning his family in an attempt to keep them safe.

In the end, the handsome, charming man knows when his time is up, knows that he is about to die.

The last words written in the journal are these:

_I’m sorry, my son._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry, my luvs, for the short chapter.
> 
> strand's reaction ~and more~ in the next installment!


	7. Talk To Me (The End - Part One)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter was getting a little long, so I'm splitting it into two parts. Next chapter should be the exciting (*wink wink*) conclusion.

Alex is in the middle of recording when Strand bursts into the room.

“I’m sorry,” says Dara, Nic and Alex’s intern. “I told Dr. Strand that you were recording, but he--”

“It’s gone,” says Strand, speaking over the young woman. “Alex, it’s _gone_.”

“Dr. Strand,” says Nic. He stands up, pulling off his headphones as he does so. He’s already slipped into his most reasonable, conflict-resolution tone. “We weren’t expecting you back for a couple more days.”

The scowl that Strand turns on Nic is so fierce that Alex takes off her own headphones. “Richard,” she says, voice soft yet firm. “Go wait for me in my office.”

Strand turns to her, staring at her with a helpless, pleading expression. Alex stares back, then points toward the door when he doesn’t move right away. “I’ll be right there.”

He gives the barest hint of a nod before ducking out of the door, the line of his shoulders tense.

As soon as she figures that Strand is out of earshot, Alex sighs and slumps against her chair. 

Of course Strand would return early from his trip to Chicago. Of course Alex wouldn’t have had enough time to put the journal back where she’d found it. And, of course they would have to have this conversation now, while Alex is still reeling from what she’d learned from Howard’s journal, while Strand is already emotionally vulnerable. 

No amount of Strand sitting at her feet will be able to fix this.

“So,” Nic says. “You going to tell me what’s going on?”

“Nic, I’ve got this.”

Nic and Dara exchange a glance over Alex’s head. Dara shrugs, confirming that she’s just as lost as he is.

“Do you? You’re not over your head here?”

Alex shakes her head. “I can handle this. Promise.”

Nic’s mouth presses into a flat, hesitant line. Then, finally, after what seems like several minutes, he deflates. “Okay, fine. But I want a full report once you’ve averted whatever crisis this is.”

Alex takes a deep breath and pushes herself away from the table. “Thanks, Nic.”

If he says anything in return, Alex doesn’t hear it. She’s already making her way back to her office, hoping against hope that Strand will be able to forgive her for this latest breach in his trust.

He’s standing in the middle of her office when Alex slips through the door. She takes one look at his expression--equal parts panic and loss--and locks the door behind her.

Alex hates the fact that _she_ is the one who did that to him. That after all of these weeks of trying to help him, trying to understand his pain and work him through it, she couldn’t keep her hands to herself and leave the journal where she’d found it. That she couldn’t wait for him to share this one thing with her once he was ready.

“Hey,” she says, keeping her voice low, overly aware that her office is not as soundproof as one of the recording studios.

Alex places her hand on the small of his back and leads him to one of the chairs in front of her desk. “Sit.”

“But--”

“Sit. I want to show you something.”

Strand sits, falling into the chair blindly, trusting Alex’s guidance completely.

Alex’s heart clenches.

Rounding her desk, Alex pulls open the bottom drawer and removes her messenger bag. She places it on the desk, slides the journal out of the bag, and pushes it across the tabletop to Strand.

Strand’s eyes go wide. “You have it. You--read it?”

Alex nods.

Strand’s eyes close, clenched tight against her admission. He takes an unsteady breath, but doesn’t say anything more.

She waits for him to shout at her, to give her the dressing down that she deserves, but nothing ever comes. She wonders, quite seriously, whether she’s finally broken him.

“Talk to me,” she says, hoping that he’ll respond if she words it as a command.

“I don’t know what to say.”

“Say that I seriously violated your trust. You only gave me the spare key to your house--your father’s house, sorry--so that I could continue watching the Tapes. Tell me that I betrayed you, stole from you.”

Strand shakes his head.

“No?” Alex asks, half-way to incredulous. “Why not?”

“Because you didn’t--you couldn’t. On some level, I should have known--”

“No. Listen to me. You shouldn’t have to expect that sort of thing from people. Not your friends. Not your family. Not from _me_. Do you understand? What I did was wrong and I’m sorry.” 

Strand shakes his head again.

“What? You don’t understand?”

Another shake of his head. 

“Richard, I need you to talk to me.”

His hands clench and unclench in his lap. His eyes, when he finally looks at her, are very far away. “You read my father’s journal. You should know that it’s nothing less than I deserve.”

There’s a long silence as Alex tries to process Strand’s words.

Strand doesn’t move, not an inch, but still, he seems to shrink under her scrutiny. 

At last, Alex rounds her desk, coming to stand in the small space between her desk and Strand’s knees. She takes his face in both of her hands and forces him to look up at her. “I don’t know what journal you were reading, but _none_ of this has been your fault.”

“I shouldn’t have said anything. About the Tall Men. Cheryl knew. She begged me not to say anything.”

“You were a child.”

“So was she.”

Alex sweeps her thumbs over both of his cheekbones in lieu of attempting to shake some sense into him. “You couldn’t have known what your father was doing. That he was treating you like some kind of experiment.”

“I should have. It was so, so _obvious_ what he was doing. Bringing me arcane gifts. Giving me a taste for the occult. If I had just _seen_ what was right in front of me, _none_ of this would be happening.”

He closes his eyes, unable to look at her any longer.

Alex kisses him, soft and chaste. “For someone with two doctorates from Ivy League schools, you can be _such_ an idiot. And not because you didn’t realize your father was part of a cult bent on world domination, or whatever, until after he was already dead.”

One of his hands snakes up to grab at the fabric of her shirt, his fingers twisting in the cotton as if to anchor himself. “How can you still touch me, knowing what you know?”

This time, Alex does shake him. Not violently, just enough to make sure that he’s paying attention. “Do you believe that you’re some kind of conduit for a goddess of chaos?”

“No. Of course not.”

Alex smiles. “I didn’t think so. Do you think your dad truly thought so?”

The answer doesn’t come right away. “I don’t know.”

“Would you have done any of what he did to you and Cheryl to Charlie? If not because you believed it, but for the sake of your research?”

“ _No_.”

He says it so vehemently that Alex can’t help but kiss him again. He sighs into it, opening for her when she demands entrance. His hand tightens in her shirt as the other comes to settle on her waist.

“And how about Coralee?” she asks, once she pulls away. “Would you do what she did to you to anyone else?”

He winces, the subject of his wife still sore. “I--no. Never.”

“Did you, personally, have anything to do with the disappearances of the Hochman family? With Sebastian Torres? Did you have a hand in Maddie Frank’s murder? Keith Dabic? Or the monks in the woods?”

“No, Alex, I--” He stops when her smile only grows wider.

“I know, dummy,” she says. She brushes her hands through his hair, pulling just a little, just the way he likes. “You’re not responsible for other people’s actions. Including those of your father. So what do you have to feel guilty for?”

When he doesn’t answer, Alex pulls at his hair again, making him hiss in pleasure-pain. “I’m going to keep saying it until it finally gets through that thick skull of yours. Until then, do you still want me to punish you?”

A faint pink spreads across his cheeks. “Yes.”

“Why?”

She expects something along the lines of deserving it, but he surprises her when he says. “I like it. It’s quiet, when you tell me what to do.”

“Okay,” she says. “I can work with that.”

She pulls his hands away from her and takes a step back. “On your knees. Ten minutes. For interrupting Nic and me while we were recording.”

Alex waits for him to slip down to the floor before moving to her seat behind her desk. She sets the alarm on her phone and, only watching him out of the corner of her eye, begins to go to work on her computer.


	8. Touch Me (The End Part Two)

Alex's phone buzzes, signaling the end of Strand’s ten minutes.

Without a word, she silences the alarm and gets up from her chair, moving to stand before him.

She loves the sight of him, on his knees, staring up at her. He’d started off strong, but had started to shift about halfway through. She's so proud of him for making it the whole ten minutes, for not jumping to his feet as soon as her phone started to vibrate. He hadn't so much as made a sound.

She kisses him, bending down to capture his mouth under hers. “Are you sorry?”

“Yes.”

“You won't do it again?”

He shakes his head. “I’ll be good.”

_Fuck_.

Her own knees go weak. Heat pools between her legs and she shifts, pressing her thighs together. “I know you will. You’ve been so good already. Do you want to get up off the floor now?”

He ducks his head, cheeks flushing. “I think my legs may have gone to sleep.”

Tipping his chin up with a finger, Alex bends down to kiss him again. She nibbles on his bottom lip, soothes the hurt with her tongue when he groans. “I’ll help you up.”

She offers him her hand and pulls when he grasps it tight in his own. He stumbles a little, his knees unable to hold his weight.

Alex uses this to her advantage, putting her arm around his back and guiding him toward the couch she keeps in her office, the one that she used to catch quick naps on during all night investigations, back before her insomnia took over, before sleep began to feel like a huge, impossible task. She pushes him down onto the worn cushions, and then, without letting herself think too hard, climbs onto Strand’s lap, straddling him. “Tell me no, if this isn’t something that you want.”

He doesn’t say anything. He simply stares back at her, his gaze hot with such unrestrained desire that it nearly leaves her breathless.

Taking a handful of his shirt, she pulls him in for another kiss, demanding entrance and tangling her tongue with his as soon as he opens for her. Strand makes a desperate sound and lets her have her way, meeting her passion with a fire of his own.

Still, even as her hands move from the cotton of his shirt, up and over his shoulders, her fingers tugging at the hair at the nape of his neck, he doesn’t touch, doesn’t take. His hands remain at his side, clenching and unclenching into fists.

“Do you want to touch me?” she asks.

“Yes. _Alex_.”

Her name sounds like a prayer falling from his lips. It sends a shiver down her spine. “Where?”

“Everywhere,” he breathes. “Every part of you.”

Alex shifts as his words rush through her, unconsciously grinding down, seeking friction as the most sensitive part of her _throbs_ with want.

Strand sucks in a surprised breath, his eyes closing as his head falls back.

Alex moves again, this time on purpose. She wants to know what other sorts of sounds she can pull out of him.

He doesn’t disappoint her. Strand’s nails dig into the cushions on either side of him. “A-Alex.”

“Touch me,” she says, finally giving him permission.

His hands go immediately to her waist, and this time, when she rolls her hips, he uses his hold on her to steady her as he bucks up beneath her. 

She can feel him, half-hard and trapped within the confines of his clothing, pressed against her center. She could easily ride him to completion just like this, with both of them fully clothed, urging herself along as she ruts against his cock. It would be so satisfying to see him come undone with so little effort. To see the kind of power that she has over this man.

But she has so many other plans, so much she wants to do to him, to make him shudder apart under her careful worship. She doesn’t want _easy_. Not yet.

Alex kisses along his jaw. “I want to take such good care of you.”

Strand makes a sound very much like a whimper. His fingers tighten on her waist.

Scraping her teeth against his skin, listening to the way his breath changes as she does so, Alex asks. “Is that what you want?”

She pulls away, searching his face.

“Yes,” he says.

Alex grins. “Yes, what?”

The blue of Strand’s eyes is nearly lost, his pupils are so dilated. “Yes, _please_.”

“Good,” Alex says. She untangles her hands from his hair, watching as his expression changes from disappointment to interest as she begins to unbutton her shirt.

Strand’s eyes follow as her fingers move from button to button, lingering just a little as more and more of her skin is revealed to him.

When her shirt is finally hopen, she lets him look his fill, her breasts on display, still bound by the lace of her bra. “Touch me,” she says.

Strand looks at her, all at once uncertain.

“Here,” she says. She takes both of his hands, still on her waist, and slides them passed the barrier of her shirt, moving them up her body to cup both of her breasts.

Strand follows her lead, brushing his thumbs across her nipples, his nails catching, sending a thrill of pleasuring singing through her, even through the lace.

Alex gasps. She rocks against him instinctively, arching her back to give him better access.

Strand groans, full hard now, his cock straining against his slacks.

His lips find the sensitive skin along the column of her throat, leaving open-mouth kisses until he finds her pulse point. He tastes her heartbeat, feeling with his tongue how it races.

Alex’s hands grip at Strand’s shoulders as she tries hard not to moan outright.

Their lips meet again, moving hot and messy and oh-so perfect against each other. Strand’s tongue darts out, hesitant and questioning. Alex lets him in, lets him explore. Then, her hands carding through his hair, she pulls, taking control. She invades his mouth, sliding her tongue along his. 

Breaking away, not giving either of them time to breathe, she surges up, dragging her heaving breasts against his chest, enjoying the pleasure that shoots through her. She directs him, manhandles him by his hair, silently demanding that he put his mouth on her.

He does. He kisses along her collarbone, then buries his face in her chest, breathing hard. 

“Alex,” he says, and mouths the swell of her breast.

“Fuck, Richard, you--”

There is a knock at the door. Followed by the concerned voice of Nic. “Alex, everything okay?”

Alex is going to _kill_ him. “Yeah, Nic. Everything’s fine.”

There’s a pause, where Alex imagines her producing partner shuffling outside her office. “You sure?”

Alex sighs, then gasps as Strand’s mouth resumes what it had been doing. She swears she can feel him smile against her skin. 

She gives him a look that tells him _exactly_ how she intends to punish him later, but it doesn’t stop him as his tongue ducks under the fabric of her bra, the tip of it teasing at the sensitive bud of her nipple. “I-I’ll be right there, Nic.”

“Okay.”

Neither Alex nor Strand moves until they hear footsteps retreating down the hall.

Taking Strand’s face in her hands, she kisses him, meaning to be brief, but lingering instead. Their passion has only been dampened down to embers, so easy to realight, to rekindle, if only they had the time.

Without breaking contact, she feels Strand begin to do up the buttons of her shirt. She bites down on his lower lip, then pulls away, huffing with quiet laughter when she takes in the sight of him.

“You look like a disaster,” she says, smiling.

The look he gives her tells her that, for once, he puts the blame entirely on her shoulders.

“Here,” she says, and tries to smooth back his hair. The dark strands of it look only slightly less mussed when she’s through.

Her legs protest when she finally pulls herself from his lap. “I have a feeling that this is going to take a while. Can I meet you back at your house? Tonight?”

“I--yes. I-I may need a few minutes.”

Alex smiles, eyeing his lap knowingly. “Take all the time you need.”

She leaves him to compose himself, taking a moment to straighten her shirt and pull her own hair into a messy ponytail in the ladies restroom before going to Nic’s office.

This is one conversation that she isn’t excited to have. Especially considering the plans she has in store for Strand as soon as it’s over.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> YOU GUISE, I AM SO SORRY 
> 
> ...or, am I? >:)
> 
> I SWEAR, next chapter is for realsies THE END. Complete with ACTUAL SMUT. (I'm already two pages into it and I can promise you that, YES, it is happening, I am not a lying liar who lies. :P)


	9. Trust Me (The End Part Three)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Did ya'll want five whole pages of smut? Because this is literally five whole pages of smut.
> 
> Depending on how I feel about life, I might still have an epilogue in me. :P But for now, this is THE END.

As soon as Strand opens the door, Alex pushes, hands on either side of his chest, until his back hits the wall. She kicks the door closed with her foot, her attention never leaving his face. “Do you still want me to take care of you?”

Stunned into silence, Strand can only nod. 

“Upstairs?” she asks, hoping to clarify her meaning.

Strand swallows. “Oh. Yes.”

Alex takes his hand, leading him through the hous, stopping once on the landing of the stairs and taking advantage of standing at his height to snake her hand behind his head and pull him down for a kiss.

Strand’s arms wind around her waist, pulling her close, but Alex doesn’t intend to stay on the landing for long. She pulls away, smile full of promise, and resumes her lead.

His room feels less alien than it had a week ago, his presence filling it up, bringing life into the Spartan space. 

“You took the journal with you when you left,” she says. “Please tell me you didn’t put it back under your pillow.”

Strand shakes his head. “I’m tired of looking at it. I left it in the basement. With the letters.”

Alex breathes a sigh of relief. “Good. I’m tired of looking at it too.”

And with that, she pulls at the hem of his sweater. He’s too tall for her to pull it over his head, but Strand takes the hint, discarding it at his feet and waiting for further instructions.

His shirt is next. Alex undoes each of the buttons, taking her time to push each tiny button through each hole. She places kisses on each of his wrists when she unbuttons his cuffs. Finally, she pushes the cotton from his shoulders, watching it pool on the ground next to his sweater. He’s still swearing a tee underneath, which makes Alex smile. “Off.”

Strand follows her instructions and soon he’s standing shirtless before her. 

He’s still way too skinny, having lost so much weight over the last year. She can see the outlines of his ribs. She kisses each one, allowing her hands to wander as she does, feeling him shiver under her touch. 

She undoes his belt next. She doesn’t bother removing it, however. Instead, she pops the button on his slacks, slides the zipper down, and gives them an encouraging push downwards, where they pool at his feet.

Strand steps out of them, kicking them to join the pile of clothing on the floor. 

He stands there, clad in just his underwear, his cock already straining deliciously at the seam of his boxer briefs. 

Alex palms him, delighting in his sharp intake of breath and the way he fights not to buck into her touch. She rubs him through the fabric, teasing him, before moving her hands to the elastic of his underwear. She pauses, meeting his eyes, pupils already blown wide with lust. “You can say no.”

He opens his mouth to protest, but Alex puts a finger over his lips. “No, listen. You can say no, at any time. Just because I tell you to do something, it doesn’t mean I want you to do it if it makes you too uncomfortable.”

Alex wonders if he’s conscious of the way some of the tension leaks out of him. “Okay,” he says. And when Alex continues to watch him, he smiles his sideways smile. “I promise.”

Alex grins.

With one shove and another kick, Strand is completely naked. She eyes him, gaze traveling over every inch of exposed skin.

“You’re gorgeous, do you know that?”

Strand flushes. Hiding behind suits and long sleeves, Alex would have never known that the color doesn’t just dust his cheekbones. His pale chest turns an endearing pink, all the way up to his shoulders.

“It’s true. I may have used the term ‘handsome’ for the podcast, but my first thought, when I finally met you in person, was along the lines of ‘Holy shit, that man is gorgeous.’”

The blush deepens and Strand ducks his head. He shifts from foot to foot and Alex delights in the shy breath of laughter that escapes him.

Alex finally lets herself give in and touch him, for the first time since she’d completely undressed him, one hand moving up his chest, up and around the back of his neck to drag him in for a kiss, while the other travels lower, brushing over his hipbone, down his leg, as far as she can reach, before moving inward. She drags her nails along the skin of his inner thighs, always making sure to get teasingly close to his cock, but never quite touching.

The noises Strand makes as she dominates the kiss are encouraging--soft sighs, small sounds of frustration when her fingers dance around everywhere but where he wants her to touch most. It makes Alex want more of him. She’s positively _hungry_ with desire, in a way that she’s never been before. Oh, she’s wanted sex, she’s even enjoyed it with most of her previous partners, but she’s never been so _ravenous_ , as if she’d been starving all along and had just never known it.

“Fuck,” she says, gasping as she pulls away. She pushes him, much as she’d done earlier. But instead of surprise, all Alex can see is trust in his face--in his whole relaxed demeanor--as she walks him backwards until the back of his legs hit his pristinely made bed. Giving him a playful shove, she knocks him back onto the bed. He lands with a bit of a bounce, looking up at her as he sits back on his forearms.

“Scoot up a bit,” she tells him.

He does, until his entire body is laid out before her. The view, somehow, is even better than before. His hair is disheveled, his glasses askew. His cock strains upward, desperate for her touch.

Still fully clothed--only taking a second to step out of her flats--Alex crawls up the bed after him. She kisses along his leg, his inner thigh, his stomach. She catches one of his nipples between her teeth and smiles around it when he gasps, his hips bucking up the slightest bit.

Moving ever upward, Alex licks and nibbles along his collarbone. She buries her face in the crook of his shoulder, worrying at the flesh there with her teeth. She kisses her way up his neck, breathing him in, taking in his cologne and beneath it, the smell she recognizes as all of Strand’s own.

Finally, she lays a kiss upon his lips.

Strand shivers when her fingers brush through his hair. “May I--?”

Alex smiles. “Not yet. I want to taste every part of you, first.”

Strand groans as she begins to make her way down the other side of his neck, visiting each part of him in the opposite order--neck, shoulder, collarbone. She pays each site particular attention, making sure to spend just as much time as she had with its counterpart, until Strand is a panting mess beneath her.

His cock, still untouched, stands at attention, the head glistening with pre-come. She takes it in hand, making Strand hiss at the contact. When she begins to stroke him, slowly, teasingly, he throws his head back and pants. “A-Alex.”

“I’ve got you. I’m going to take such good care of you. Trust me.” With that promise, Alex licks a wide stripe up the underside of his shaft, before taking him into her mouth.

Strand cries out, his back arching, but Alex lays an arm over his hips, reminding him to be still. 

She takes her time here, too, exploring to her heart’s content. Strand’s hands clutch at the bedspread on either side of him when she sucks, her cheeks hollowing out. She swirls her tongue over the head and pumps her hand along the length of him in time with her movements and he drags in an unsteady breath. 

She pulls off, biting the inside of his thigh just before pulling away completely. Strand whimpers, looking up at her through nearly dazed eyes.

Without a word, Alex begins to unbutton her shirt. She tosses it aside, not caring where it lands. Reaching behind her, she unclasps her bra, sending it flying in the general direction of her shirt. She has to stand to shimmy out of her jeans. Her panties are the last addition to their respective piles.

She slides her way up along his body as she returns to the bed. She takes both of his hands drags his arms up and over his head, where she pins them under one of her own. “I know you said you don’t like restraints,” she says. “Is this okay?”

He shifts under her hold, dislodging her for just a moment as he moves his wrists into what she assumes is a more comfortable position. He’s strong enough that he could easily break her grip, but she waits as he takes a moment to analyse his feelings on the matter. She doesn’t move, not an inch, trying not to sway his decision one way or the other.

Finally, he replies, giving her a simple “Yes.”

Again, there is such open trust on his face that Alex almost doesn’t know what to do with it.

Almost.

Swinging a leg over Strand’s middle, she straddles him, trapping his cock between them. She’s already so wet, so ready, that all she has to do is line him up and sink down onto him.

Giving herself a moment to adjust around him, Alex bends down to kiss him. She starts to rock, slowly at first, but picks up speed as Strand finds the rhythm and thrusts up to meet her.

“So good,” she says, murmuring the words against his lips. “You feel so good.”

Strand groans and snaps his hips, hitting her at just the right angle to make her cry out.

“Ah, fuck. Right there. Right _there_.”

She abandons her hold on his hands, arching her back, as they begin to move in earnest. Strand takes this as permission to touch her, hand caressing her along her side, from her hips all the way up to her breasts. He cups them, then experimentally rolls the nipple of one between his fingers. Alex’s head falls back and her eyes slip closed.

They open again as a shock of pleasure moves through her. Strand’s hands have slipped back down, one holding her waist as she rides him quick and hard and dirty, while the fingers of the other circle her clit.

She feels her climax building and she loses the rhythm, moving more and more erratically as she spurs herself on toward completion. Strand bucks up into her, using his hold on her to drive himself into her with abandon.

Alex cries out. She’s so close, so fucking close, until it crashes over her, a wave of pleasure so intense that she nearly loses herself in it. 

Beneath her, Strand begins to come undone--he trembles as she tightens around his cock, groaning when she continues to fuck herself on him. His own orgasm seems to sneak up on him. He thrusts up and freezes, shuddering as comes, spilling himself inside her. 

Exhausted, Alex lets herself collapse down on top of him, her arms pillowed on his chest. She smiles at him and runs her fingers through his sweat-slick hair. 

Strand smiles back, a soft, sweet smile, and nuzzles into her touch. He kisses the inside of her forearm and lies back, content.

“Hold on,” she says, and forces herself to get up from the bed. She pads down the hallway, taking a strange sort of glee at walking naked through his house. It only takes her a moment to clean herself up in the bathroom and she returns with a wet wash cloth. Strand moves to take it from her, but she smacks his hand out of the way and, carefully, cleans him herself. 

Tossing the cloth over the side of the bed to an amused huff of laughter from Strand, Alex pulls back the bedspread, motioning for him to do the same. 

They end up tangled together, their legs entwined, their arms wrapped around the other. 

“You said that it’s quiet, whenever I tell you what to do,” Alex whispers into the space between them. This, somehow, seems more intimate than any of the activities they had previously gotten up to.

Strand makes an inquisitive noise, his eyes closed, already halfway to sleep.

“Is it quiet now?” she continues.

Strand hums, then buries his face in her hair. “Yes. I can’t remember it being this quiet.”

His breathing evens out and Alex smiles. When her own eyes slip closed, she sleeps heavily, surrounded by Strand’s warmth, for the first time in months.


End file.
